The Dividing Soul

A brief, morbid introduction for Rasputin, the Dividing Soul. Killing him is counterproductive at best, but it hasn't stopped some from trying...

For he who had the city at his beck and call, the night was a blessed relief from their constant petitions. Their lies and requests would be held at bay until the sun ascended from the distant ocean, and for the first time since he'd risen that morning, he found the opportunity to stand in silent contemplation of it all.

The streets below were delineated by the harshness of pale, vigilant light, stretching the shadows of those who had cause to venture outdoors after dark. Guards on patrol, measured strides and heads on the swivel, or those precious few with dispensation to protect them against the strict rule of curfew.

Far less order to the rest of the lights, those gleaming from windows or above doorways despite the lateness of the hour. Restless silhouettes were cast against curtains, pacing floors or drawing together in intimate embraces.

Mundanity, everywhere he looked, and that was precisely how he liked to see it. Flowers grown in well-ordered boxes, stone houses that stood beneath matching rooftops. Even the stars had their particular patterns to occupy, predicted and named by the watchful eyes of the city's scholars.

Satisfied that all was well beyond the gates of his estate, he stepped back from the sill of that wide window. The warmth of home seemed to settle itself over his shoulders like a familiar cloak, bathed in the orange of waning lamplight. The shelves of that silent library loomed, lined from end to end with as many volumes as each could bear. The rug that coddled his slipper-clad feet was woven in an array of dizzying patterns, red fracturing through white to form an army of mirrored triangles.

A pair of ponderous, cushioned chairs to match its colour scheme, a low table built to match their wooden accents in turn. There, steam rose in curls from a waiting mug of tea, his hands clasped around its sides to mitigate the chill that his time alongside the window had introduced.

Its fragrance rose with his next breath, and the steam fled before his sigh of indolent contentment. Perfect.

The thought lingered in his mind, savoured along with the sweet citrus of the tea's aroma. Until the instant when it was extinguished along with the lamp.

A muttered curse broke from his lips as he bent to return that tea to the table. He'd expected the lamp's oil to last him until he retired in the later hours, but perhaps his mind had been elsewhere in the making of that calculation. That moonless night provided little assistance in his crossing of the room, and he was glad not to be watched as he fumbled to replenish that unreliable source of light. The curse was repeated and elaborated upon several times in the process, but finally, orange light crept to the borders of the library again.

Heaving a far different sigh, that of annoyance briefly entertained and readily dismissed, he turned back toward the drink that he'd been on the verge of taking. There to freeze halfway through the drawing of the next breath, staring at one of those luxurious chairs and the figure that had taken up residence there.

Black hair lay in tangles against broad shoulders, dressed to blend in with the city's sleeping hours. Save for the paint that marred and disguised the intruder's face, a ghoulish display of black and white at play around eyes of pale, attentive gold.

Any new face in that place, at that hour, would have been cause for alarm. But the sight before him was far worse " he knew that painted expression, that dark, ragged dress, and what he knew was cause enough for his hands to shake.

The newcomer had closed a hand over that steaming mug, gloved and braced with metal at the knuckles. As the magistrate had only seconds before, he paused for an appreciative whiff of its contents, then defied its heat by tipping its edge to his discoloured lips.

Anyone else would have died. Anyone else would have hung for their intrusion of his privacy, the implicit threat of their presence in his home after dark. There was one problem with that course of action, however, which he finally managed to voice amidst stammering.

“You-” A deep swallow freed the words that he'd meant to speak. “You're dead.” A stark statement of reality, as if that would do something to correct the impossibility of what he beheld. Perhaps he'd wake, find that it was all a vivid dream, or-

Or the other man would simply smile at him, cracking that paint to reveal the subtle point of teeth. The mug was set where it had stood before, and the newcomer's voice was as it had been during their last encounter, all of its resonant depths brimming with mockery.

“It happens sometimes,” he acknowledged, pushing himself up from the chair in which he'd been taking his rest. The magistrate had almost forgotten how he loomed, and how his shadow seemed to expand even beyond what that impressive height would allow, swallowing a large portion of the glow that the lamp had reintroduced to the room.

When the newcomer took his first step forward, the magistrate found himself freed from the initial shock that had arrested his movements, stumbling back toward the window that had occupied his attention not five minutes before. All of the words that he could have spoken seemed to fail their climb from his throat, and the newcomer was left to break the silence again as he advanced.

“You had me burned,” he recounted, as if either of them could have forgotten the ugly event. Eyes fixed on the magistrate's face, like the lights of distant ships. “I pounded the interior walls of the furnace until my body deteriorated too much to allow it, and you watched. By the time you departed for your next meeting, there was nothing left but ash.”

He remembered. Oh, he remembered. The smell of burning flesh, the screams that had made that furnace sound like the bowels of hell itself. He had been frozen then as well, trapped between the keen desire to flee and the knowledge of the strength that he displayed by refraining.

He had watched the triumphant guards sift the ash when it was done. Satisfied by a job thoroughly accomplished, he'd left by coach, planning tea with a prominent investor and businesswoman. Every detail of the day was seared into his mind, as though it had been exposed to the heat of the furnace as well.

And every one of those details told him that the sight before him was impossible. Most of the words that crowded his mind and throat would have expressed that simple fact, and would have been pointless.

His opinion of whether it was possible meant nothing. What was important was the cold stone of the windowsill at his back, preventing his further retreat. What was important was the other man's relentless approach, and the knowledge that if he'd made it that far, the guard who occupied the hall must have been eliminated. No one would hear a call for help, and if by some miracle they did, they would not arrive in time to assist him.

Even if they did, even then, he had seen how the man before him fought. No sign of the peculiar rod and hook with which he'd ruined a dozen of the city guard, but surely it was somewhere close at hand.

Together, those facts brought his racing thoughts to heel, and a nervous flick of his tongue moistened his lips in preparation to speak. Three words that meant more than any denial or bargain he could voice at that moment. “What happens now?”

For a second longer, those unnatural eyes lingered on his face. Raised from there to the window at his back, as though judging its suitability for his purpose.

The meaning was clear, and the magistrate's hands resumed their quaking as they were raised in a futile display of supplication. “No,” he wheezed from lungs that wouldn't seem to carry enough air. “No, please, I- I can give you anything you want. I can-”

The words were arrested by the sudden presence of a hand around his throat, one of those gloves, crushing every offer that he could have made. His hands were raised in turn to close around the newcomer's wrist, reflexive grasping, no good. The heartbeat in his ears was beginning to burn, all but drowning out the statement that parted those painted lips.

“No one can give me what I want,” the other man informed him, cold in tone and eyes. “Don't flatter yourself by assuming you have that sort of power.”

He would have apologized, would have tried. Anything to breathe again and stand on his own feet.

The former was granted when he found himself freed from the other man's grip, sailing through open air with a speed that tore a cry of alarm from his lips.

The latter would never be granted again, as the glass of that broad window shattered against his head and shoulders. Hands grasped at empty space, and one of those slippers slid free from a kicking foot as his next breath was raised as a scream.

That painted face peered over the sill above, golden eyes watching with keen interest as the magistrate-